


Unforgiveable

by MyOwnSuperintendent



Series: In the North [3]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Past Abortion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-07
Updated: 2014-09-07
Packaged: 2018-02-16 10:50:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,978
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2266953
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MyOwnSuperintendent/pseuds/MyOwnSuperintendent
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When she learns that Hoster Tully is coming to visit the north, Lysa is distressed by the thought of seeing the father who has hurt her for the first time in many years.  Third in the "In the North" series.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Unforgiveable

**Author's Note:**

> I don't own A Song of Ice and Fire or anything related to it. Hope you enjoy!

There is nothing about her that is lesser now. She has her children: Rodrik, her precious son, who she can scarcely believe is more than three years old already; Minisa, her sweet babe, who has a new tooth or a new word or faster steps each day; and the newest one, the one who is growing inside her, a sweet secret between her and Ben. And she has Ben, who loves her as much as she could ever want, who thinks she is beautiful and wonderful and makes her feel it too. She is happy.

And yet the letter that comes from Winterfell makes Lysa feel almost ill.

She hasn’t seen him in eight years, not since he left Winterfell two weeks after her and Cat’s weddings, and she has never wanted to. She has never wanted to because just looking at the words in Cat’s letter— _Father is coming to visit Winterfell. He will be here in just over a moon. You will come, won’t you, Lysa? I know he will want to see both of us_ —is enough to make her forget who she is now. Thinking of her father, she feels as though she is no longer Lysa Stark, the lady of a holdfast, a loved and respected wife, a proud mother. She is back to being Lysa Tully, a second daughter who is never good enough, a source of shame, a sobbing girl who has been cruelly punished.

_I know he will want to see both of us_ , Cat writes, and Lysa wonders how she can be so foolish. Of course their father is not coming north to see both of them. He is coming to see Cat, who has always been his special girl, who has never done a single thing of which he would disapprove. He would never come to see Lysa, who is nothing more than a disappointment to him, whom he certainly no longer loves if he ever did. And she does not want to see him either, and if only there was some way to explain it to Cat...

The thought of having him near her children, or near herself now that she is carrying another babe, frightens her. He might try to take away her happiness again, to hurt them, she thinks. She cannot trust him.

Ben finds her sitting and staring at the letter. “What is it?” he asks. “What’s wrong?”

She holds the letter out to him. “Look,” she says, pointing at those sentences. Ben reads silently—he will understand, she thinks, he is the only other person who knows her secret—and then he puts his hand on her shoulder gently. “I can’t, Ben,” she says, swallowing hard. “I just can’t.”

“Oh, my love,” Ben says, his hand rubbing her shoulder softly, slowly.

“I can’t,” she repeats, her voice choking her. The tears start then, and she hates her father even more.

Even Ben’s arms around her are not much comfort. As he presses her to him, stroking her hair, murmuring, “Lysa, love,” she tries to calm herself, tries to let his touch remind her of all that has changed since she last saw her father, all that she has now. But in some ways that makes her worry more.

“The children, Ben,” she sobs, “what if he hurts them?”

“Your father is not going to hurt our children,” Ben says, and perhaps he is right—in truth, Lysa cannot say what she imagines her father would do—but she still cannot make herself believe in his words.

“He would…he hates me…”

“He is not going to hurt them,” Ben repeats. “No one is going to hurt our children, Lysa.”

“You don’t know that...”

“I won’t let anyone hurt them,” Ben says firmly. “And I won’t let anyone hurt you.” She trusts Ben, but she cannot stop her sobbing. Even if her father does not do anything to hurt her now, there remains all that he has done. There remains the memory of her first babe. There remains the way that he tried to make her as unhappy as he possibly could. And if just thinking about it gives her this much pain, the idea of what seeing him will do… She cries until she can cry no more and then stays curled against Ben, her head against his shoulder and his arms still around her.

He kisses her wet cheeks. “There, Lysa,” he says. “It’ll be all right, love.” She sniffles. “We do not have to go,” he says.

Nothing would make Lysa happier than not going, and she is sure that her father would have absolutely no objections, but she does not know how they would explain it. Cat would wonder, Cat would ask, and what could she tell her…? “I don’t want everyone to know,” she says. “About…about everything.”

“They would not have to know,” Ben says. “We could make some excuse…tell them that you can’t travel with the babe coming…” He touches her belly gently. “And we do not have to decide tonight. Why don’t you think on it a bit?” It feels very difficult, but Lysa nods. Ben kisses her, and she does feel a bit better—perhaps at having him, perhaps at knowing that they need not see her father, or perhaps just at having the subject closed for now.

As she begins to go about her day the next morning, Lysa holds onto what Ben said—that they do not have to go, that they can make an excuse if they wish. Last night, she wished it more than anything in the world, but today, as she spends time with the children, she looks at the matter differently.   Rodrik has just begun to learn to ride his first pony, and she watches him as he listens to the master of horse. At first, his little face looks very serious indeed, but when he finally rides around the yard he smiles widely. Lysa’s own smile is almost as wide. “Horse!” Minisa exclaims from beside her, pointing. “Horse!”

“Yes, sweetling,” she says. “Rodrik is learning to ride a horse."

“Mama, Rodrik horse!” Minisa says, and Lysa beams at that as well. She truly can imagine no finer children than her own two. And suddenly there is a part of her that wants to prove it—that wants her father to see her children so that he can learn just how wrong he was. If they all go to Winterfell, she and Benjen and Rodrik and Minisa, her father will see that she is not worthless after all. And that is not all he will see. _You wanted to make me unhappy forever, Father, but you didn’t. I am just as good a lady as Cat is, Father, and my children are perfect, and I am very, very happy. You haven’t won, Father, and you were wrong about me. And there is no reason for me to be frightened of you now._

Even as she tells herself that there is no reason to be frightened, some of the dread that she felt last night comes back. At the moment, though, the thrill at the thought of showing her father that she is worth more than he ever dreamed is stronger. And so she scoops Minisa up into her arms, saying, “Come with me, sweetling, let’s go find Papa,” and hurries into the keep to tell Ben that she wants to go before she can let the dread overwhelm her again.

 

She sends Cat a raven that very afternoon, and they leave for Winterfell three weeks later. As they move away from home, she tries to explain the occasion to the children. “We are going to Winterfell to see our family,” she says. “Do you remember your Aunt Catelyn, Rodrik? And your Uncle Eddard?”

Rodrik screws up his face. “Maybe?” he says after a long pause.

Lysa kisses his cheek. “Well, do not worry if you cannot remember. You were very small when we saw them last.”

“As small as Minisa?” Rodrik asks. He is generally very good with his sister, but he seems continually stunned at how much smaller she is than he.

“Not quite,” Lysa says, which seems to please Rodrik. “Anyway, Aunt Catelyn is Mama’s sister, and Uncle Eddard is Papa’s brother, and he is the lord of the North. And we are going to see them and you can play with your cousins.” She pauses, wondering what she should say about her father. There is nothing she really can say, and she decides that it is best to keep it simple. “And my father will be there too.”

“Your father?” Rodrik asks. “You have a father, Mama?”

“Of course I do. Everyone has a father,” Lysa says, realizing that the idea of their parents having parents must seem very strange to her children. Ben’s mother and father are both dead, as is her own mother, and she has never mentioned her father to the children before this moment.

Rodrik looks at her doubtfully. “We’ve never seen him.”

“He lives in the south,” Lysa says, “but he is coming for a visit.”

“Is he like Papa?” Rodrik asks.

Even hearing the question makes her recoil. “No. No, sweetling, he is nothing like Papa.”

“Papa!” Minisa shouts, pointing at Ben through the window of the wheelhouse, determined to have her part in the conversation. “Papa, Papa, Papa!” He hears her and smiles, waving his hand at all of them. The children wave back, and Lysa waves too, more thankful than she can say that her husband is nothing like her father.

They arrive at Winterfell before her father does, and Lysa is glad of that. It is nice to have the time with Cat and to talk about their children together. They have not seen each other since Cat’s Arya was a small babe and Minisa a smaller one still; now Arya chases Rodrik as he chases Robb, and Minisa exclaims “Yes!” when Sansa asks her if she promises to be very careful before putting a doll in her arms. And there is another babe as well: Cat’s youngest, little Bran, is just a few weeks old, and he nurses or sleeps in his cradle as Lysa and Cat talk.

“Gods, Cat, I can’t believe you’re having visitors now,” Lysa says. “Aren’t you tired?”

Cat smiles. “Of course I am, a bit. But it’s not as though we’re having hundreds of guests. You are my family. You know I always like to see you, Lysa—and it will be wonderful to see Father again.”

Lysa cannot respond to that last statement with any degree of enthusiasm, and, fearful that Cat will notice if she is silent, she quickly switches the subject back again. “Still, though…now that you have four…”

“It doesn’t feel like that many more,” Cat says. “Two was the biggest change, I think. After that, I suppose I grew accustomed to having more than one needing something at a time.” She laughs, seeming very happy with her four children.

Lysa runs a hand over her own belly—the babe has not grown big enough for her to feel anything yet, but she likes to do so anyway, to know that the babe is there. “Well, I suppose I shall know about that soon enough,” she says.

Cat looks confused for a moment; then she glances down at Lysa’s hand, and her eyes widen. “Lysa, are you with child again?” Lysa nods, smiling at her, and she exclaims, “Oh, that is wonderful news! I am so pleased for you.”

“Thank you,” Lysa says. “I’m only a few moons along, but I’m very happy.”

“Of course you are,” Cat says, reaching out to squeeze Lysa’s hand in her own.  

It should be a happy moment, and yet worry suddenly strikes Lysa. She says, impulsively, “Don’t tell anyone yet. Please. Only Ben knows.”

Cat nods and seems to think nothing of it, and Lysa is left feeling half-ridiculous at her fear; this is a trueborn babe she carries, Ben’s babe, and her father would not dare to… But she cannot be sure of anything where he is concerned, and by that evening she is wishing that she had decided not to make the journey. Her ideas of proving to her father that she is worth something after all seem foolish now. _As though he will be impressed by your children_ , she tells herself. _He will never appreciate how wonderful they are. He’s never cared for anything you did, only what Cat did, and she has more children than you anyway and two of them are sons…_ She hates that he can make her feel uneasy with Cat again. _Why did you ever think that it would be a good idea to come and see him, Lysa? Maybe he’s right after all; maybe you are a stupid, stupid fool…_

“I can’t do this,” she tells Ben when he comes to join her that night in the chambers they have been given.

His face is sympathetic, but his response is only, “Well, we are already here.” Perhaps he thinks that she is stupid too, stupid for her hasty decision and her nerves now when she cannot change it.

“I know we are here,” she says. “But I can’t do it, Ben. He hates me…and I hate him too.”

“I know you do, Lysa,” Ben says, “but he will likely be here on the morrow, and it isn’t as though we can just leave. I am sorry, but…I don’t see that anything can be done about it.”

“Nothing can be done about any of it,” Lysa says, and even she is surprised by how her voice sounds—how close it is to a scream. “Nothing can be done about any of it, Ben! No matter what I do, none of it will ever change. Even if I could make him realize now…it wouldn’t even matter…” She is crying now, and when Ben tries to put a hand on her shoulder she jerks away, feeling as though she can never be comforted. “It wouldn’t even matter…it would still have happened…he killed my babe and he ruined all my happiness…” She cannot speak any more, and when she thinks of seeing her father again, the only picture she gets is of him handing her that tea. She can almost smell it—it smelled strange or did it, is that just what she thinks now, but however it smelled she never suspected… It is as though days have passed instead of years.

Ben lets her cry without trying to touch her again. It is not until she draws in a gasping breath and manages to say, “I hate him…he ruined all my happiness…” that he speaks.

“Lysa,” he says, and his voice sounds pained now too, “is that…is that really what you think? That he ruined all your happiness? Do you—Lysa, do you wish that you’d had the babe and married that boy?”

Such a question stops Lysa short. She doesn’t think about it that way. Of course she has mourned her babe and what was taken away from her, and in the first years of her marriage she longed for that stolen chance bitterly. In recent years, though, her mourning has always seemed entirely separate from her life with Ben; of course it is impossible that she should have had both lives, but to choose one over the other… Right now, though, she cannot stand the idea of Ben being angry with her or thinking that she is not happy in her life with him and their children. Ben and the children are her life now, special perhaps partly because they are so far removed from all that grief, and she cannot let her father take Ben away from her too. She cannot.

“No,” she says. “No, Ben, no.”

“I just…I want to make you happy, Lysa,” Ben says, “and I like to think that I do. But it almost seems—”

“You do make me happy,” Lysa says. “You do. I swear it. I’m not unhappy because of you, Ben…I don’t wish that you weren’t my husband…I don’t know what I wish, but I swear it isn’t that…I am glad you are my husband, Ben…Please don’t be angry with me.”

“I am not angry with you,” Ben says, touching her hand, but even though she believes him the tone of his voice is not very reassuring.

She needs to do something to stop it all, to chase away Ben’s doubts about her and her own doubts about herself. She clutches at his hand and says, “I love you, Ben. I always will. Make love to me. Please.”

Ben’s touch always makes her feel desired and tonight, thankfully, is no different; he kisses her and looks at her as if no one could ever be so special. He cannot be doubting her anymore, she thinks, and she kisses him back especially ardently, murmuring, “My Ben…my Ben…” When he is inside her, it brings her the pleasure it always does, and her worries fall away.

They stay away in the moments afterwards, when they whisper endearments to each other, but once Ben has fallen asleep Lysa finds herself tossing and turning. _What is it that I wish?_ she wonders. She wishes she had not lost her babe, of course, that her father had not tricked her in such a cruel way. She would have married Petyr then, she supposes; she loved him so much when she was a girl, and they could have been happy together. But then she would never have married Ben, Ben who makes her happier than anyone and who looks at only her as Petyr never did. And without marrying Ben, she would never have borne Rodrik and Minisa, and she cannot imagine being without them either. Truly, she cannot say what she wishes.

_There is no way it can all be right_ , she thinks. _If it is this horrible now, I cannot imagine what it will be like when he is actually here._ She falls asleep eventually, her head pressed against Ben’s chest, her mind still full of uneasy thoughts.

Lysa cannot keep her nerves steady the next morning; she knows that she must not seem herself, and Cat does ask her if she is feeling well. “Yes, I am well,” she says, busying herself with Minisa to avoid having to talk further.

They all gather in the courtyard when her father’s party is sighted. Lysa is glad to feel Ben’s hand on her arm. She bites at her lip as the horses approach, as the men dismount and her father is finally among them.

He looks older now, but his voice is no different, and his first words are just what Lysa would have expected. “Little Cat!”

“Father!” Cat exclaims, moving eagerly into his embrace. “Father, it is so wonderful to see you again.”

“It is wonderful to see you too, my girl,” their father says. “The Seven know I don’t begrudge Eddard your company, but eight years is quite a long time.”

Cat laughs. “And how is everything at Riverrun? How is Edmure?”

“Oh, he’s very well,” says their father. “He sends you both his love, of course.” As he says “both,” his eye falls upon Lysa, and she forces herself to stand up straight and look back.

“Lysa,” he says, releasing Cat and coming towards her. “It is a fine thing to see you as well.” His embrace startles her, and she is thankful that he does not prolong the farce for long, releasing her after a few seconds.

She will not tell him that it is a fine thing to see him, so she simply says, “Hello, Father.” She cannot even keep her voice entirely steady for that.

She is very glad when Cat steps into the conversation again. “Father, you must meet the children.”

“Of course,” their father says. “This is the new arrival, I take it?” he asks, gesturing to Bran, who is bundled in Cat’s arms.

“Yes,” Cat says smiling. “My letter won’t have gotten there before you left Riverrun. His name is Bran.”

“What a fine babe,” their father says, examining the bundle more closely. “And you are well, Cat?”

“Very well,” Cat says. “Come, meet the others too.”

Cat’s children and Lysa’s are standing grouped together, and their father furrows his brow slightly as he looks at them. “Surely there are more than you said.”

Cat laughs. “It seems like that at times. But there aren’t really any more, Father—just the six. These three are mine,” she says, beckoning Robb, Sansa, and Arya towards her, “and these are Lysa’s.” Lysa moves to stand by Rodrik and Minisa, grateful that Cat at least does not seem to have noticed their father’s ignorance of her children. She wonders if he knows anything at all about them—if Cat has perhaps mentioned them in her letters—for she certainly has never written to him. “Children, this is your grandfather,” Cat continues. “Father, these are Robb, Sansa, and Arya.”

Sansa sweeps a miniature curtsey, and their father laughs as he bends down to greet the children. “Why, you are quite the lady, aren’t you?” he says. “I’m very pleased to meet you all.”

“We’re pleased to meet you too, Grandfather,” says Robb. “Mother has told us about you.”

“And she has written me much about all of you, lad,” says their father. “I am glad to have the chance to see you at last—but you are almost a man now!” Robb beams at that. Arya reaches out to tug at his sleeve then; he turns and hoists her up into the air as she laughs.

Only after he has fussed over Cat’s children does he look at Lysa’s. “And these two are yours, Lysa?”

Lysa nods stiffly. “Yes. This is Rodrik, and this is Minisa.”

“Hello, Rodrik,” he says. “Why, you look as though you are almost a man too! Now tell me, how old are you?”

“Three,” says Rodrik. “Almost three and six moons.”

“My my,” her father says. “That is very grown up indeed.” Lysa opens her mouth to speak, for she cannot stand seeing her father chattering away to her son as if he has a right to do it, but Rodrik forestalls her.

“And Minisa is one,” he says. “Minisa is my sister.”

“Hello, Minisa,” her father says; he reaches out to smooth her hair, and Lysa would like to snatch her babe away. “You have a very pretty name.”

Lysa clears her throat. “It is getting very cold out here,” she says. “I think we ought to take the children inside.”

“Yes, let’s do that,” says Cat. “You must be tired from the journey, Father. Let’s go inside where we can talk and rest.”

Lysa takes both children’s hands to lead them inside, inwardly reeling. She does not know what she thinks. Of course she wanted her father to admire her children, to see that she is no lesser than Cat, but now that he seems to be doing so she cannot trust his actions. Her father hates her, and how could he sincerely like her children if that is the case? But if he does not like her children, why is he pretending to do so—who does he think he needs to fool? He has not done anything horrible yet, and perhaps he does not mean to do anything horrible; perhaps this visit will be more a matter of discomfort than of anguish. But somehow Lysa cannot imagine anything that involves her father not being a matter of anguish.

As they head to the great hall for the noon meal, Ben falls into step beside her again; his mouth close to her ear, he asks, “Are you all right, love?”

“I…I am well enough,” she says. It is the best answer she can think of at the moment. In truth, she is more confused than anything.

Ben squeezes her hand. “I am right here.”

“I know you are,” she says, and she turns to kiss him. The kiss goes on for a bit longer than she meant it to, as Ben presses her close in his arms, and when they break apart, she sees her father looking at them.

She almost likes that; her father should see that, should know that there is one man who thinks her worth more than all the world. She holds his gaze for a moment and then turns back to Ben. “We’d best get to lunch, my love.” And they take their seats at the table with the rest, and Cat laughs and talks with their father, and Lysa smiles a tight smile and pretends that nothing at all is the matter.

Pretending that nothing at all is the matter occupies most of Lysa’s time over the next few weeks. She cannot pretend fully—she will never seek out her father’s company, or laugh with him as Cat does, or forgive him for anything—but she can sit there at meals without crying, at least, without screaming and demanding to know why he did what he did. It is a hard thing to do: sometimes, as when she sees how affectionate he is towards Cat, a very hard thing. But she manages, keeping her false smile as steady as she can, answering remarks that her father directs at her as briefly as possible. When it comes to conversation, her father is finding himself rather limited in his choice of partners. Lysa cannot and will not say much. Perhaps out of solidarity with her, Ben is not his talkative self when they are all together. And she has never seen Eddard talkative in any situation.

Cat talks enough for all of them, though. She is happy to see their father again, and Lysa tries not to be angry at her for that. He has always loved Cat, after all, and Cat does not know what he did…But at the same time she wonders how Cat can be so blind to the tension between them, how she can be in a room with both Lysa and their father and not feel the hate, not trace Lysa’s unhappiness to its source.

For Cat does seem to have noticed that Lysa is not herself. She frequently asks her if she is well, and one morning she puts a hand on Lysa’s arm and says, “If something is wrong, Lysa, and it would help you to speak of it…”

Lysa shakes her head. “There is nothing,” she says.

Cat still looks concerned, though. “You are not ill, are you? Is everything well with the babe?” she asks, glancing at Lysa’s belly.

“No, I am not ill,” Lysa says. “And the babe is well.”

“Is it something with the children?” Cat asks. “You’ve seemed so anxious when we’re with them.”

Lysa shakes her head again. “No. No, the children are well too.”

Cat looks at her for another moment, then leans in to embrace her quickly. “I will not press you. Just know that I am here if you need anything.” She is being so kind, and for half a minute Lysa thinks that it would be a comfort to tell her, to explain what their father did. But the thought of speaking of it again makes her throat grow tight, and she cannot help but worry how Cat would react—whether Cat would think her wrong for having lain with Petyr, whether she would try to make excuses for their father. _You have Ben_ , she reminds herself. _You have Ben, and he knows about it; he is there to comfort you. You do not need Cat for this._

She smiles and returns Cat’s embrace, saying, “I do know that. Thank you.” Cat smiles back and begins talking about the beautiful weather and about how she and their father thought it would be a good idea to take all the children outside after Robb has finished his lessons. And Lysa wonders again how Cat can realize that there is something wrong and not realize at all what is causing it.

She is right about one thing, though. Lysa has been anxious when they are with the children. It is because their father is so often there too, and Lysa still cannot decide what she feels about the way he acts around the children.

Oh, he is perfectly nice. And Lysa has to admit that he does not treat her children any differently than he treats Cat’s; he fusses over all of them, talking and asking them questions and sneaking them treats at meals. All of this merely confuses Lysa, though. He is far more affectionate with Cat than he is with her, addressing most of his conversation to her, only occasionally remembering to include Lysa and usually when Cat has done so first. It is as it has always been, and if there is such a difference in how he sees them, how can he see their children just the same? And if he does truly like Lysa’s children, why…why does that not seem to make him sorry? If he would just acknowledge, even for a moment, that he has done something to be sorry for, that Lysa can barely look at him without pain…but he does not seem to know it.

Or perhaps he does know it, and perhaps he is trying to cause her more pain. For Lysa cannot deny that it hurts her to see the way her children respond to him. Rodrik, in particular, seems pleased with her father’s company, with the way her father says that he is almost a man and plays at games of knights with him and Robb. And Minisa will smile at anyone who smiles at her; she is too young to know any differently. _They are both too young to know_ , Lysa thinks; there is no way that she can tell her children that she hates her own father, and she knows it is not their fault that they answer her father’s affections with her own. Both of her children are sweet babes, and she would not have them any different. All she can do is keep them close to her and try to make the time they spend with her father as short as possible. It is easy enough to do with Minisa, who is still small enough to want only her mother most of the time, who will frequently lift up her arms to be carried and will rest contentedly in Lysa’s own arms. It is harder to manage with Rodrik, though. Not having any brother of his own, he is always eager to follow Robb about, and Cat, of course, is not going to try to keep Robb from spending time with their father. Rodrik will stay by Lysa’s side for a time, but then he is always off after his cousin, and her father is with them too, and she cannot help being upset by the shouts of joy with which her own son greets him. When she does get Rodrik to come sit with her, he usually chatters nonstop about what he has been playing; these stories usually involve her father, and acting as though she enjoys listening is the hardest thing in the world. She manages it as well as she can—she does not want Rodrik to think that she does not care about what he has to say—but she is grateful when Ben joins them, when he can take over listening to Rodrik for her and she can busy herself with something else.

Their visit at Winterfell seems to go on forever with her father there. Lysa cannot ever become used to seeing him, and each day is long and wearing. She does what she can to keep herself going: excusing herself from his presence as often as she can without arousing suspicion, lingering over those moments that she does get alone with her children, losing herself in Ben’s arms at night. She counts the days until they can all leave. She no longer cries as she did when she first learned that he was coming, nor is she so terrified, but she does not think that she has ever felt so tired.

Cat is tired too, although for a different reason: little Bran has been keeping her awake at night. “You should rest, Cat,” Lysa tells her as they are leaving the great hall one morning. “I’ll stay with the children.”

Cat shakes her head. “I am not too tired. Truly.” She yawns.

“Lysa is right, Cat,” Eddard adds, laying a hand on Cat’s arm. “And you know the children will be safe with her. You must look after yourself.”

After another half-hearted protest, Cat gives in, allowing Eddard to walk her to her chambers. He and Ben go off somewhere together, and Lysa retires to the nursery with the children. She is sitting on the floor with a drowsy Minisa on her lap, listening to Sansa talk about her dolls, when she hears footsteps coming into the room. She looks up. It is her father.

“Cat is resting,” she said. “She is tired from the babe.”

Her father nods. “It is good that she is getting rest then,” he says, taking a seat in a chair. Lysa wishes that he would go. Why does he not go, now that he knows that Cat is not here?

She tries to turn back to Sansa, but the others have started a game of knights, and Sansa goes over to them, saying that she will be a maiden for them to rescue. Lysa is still determined not to look at her father, though; she does not care if it is rude, and she stares at the children playing as if her life depended on it.

“Your children are very sweet, Lysa.” His voice is quiet, but she can’t shut it out.

“Yes,” she says. “Yes, I am very proud of them.”

“You…you should be,” he says. “Rodrik is quite a smart boy. And Minisa is a lovely babe.” He is quiet for a moment. “Are you…are you happy, Lysa?”

Now she will tell him. Now she will show him that he has not ruined everything for her. “Yes,” she says. “I am very happy. I have the children and Ben, and we’re all very happy. And we are going to have another babe soon,” she adds recklessly. Let him know. She’s not stupid enough to trust him now, and anyway she has Ben to protect her. Let him see just how happy she is.

“Another babe? That is wonderful news,” her father says. “I…well, I have always wanted you to be happy, Lysa.” This reply is so far from what she expected that she turns to look at him. He is actually smiling at her, a tentative, almost timid smile.

He means it, she realizes, and the thought shocks her. He has not spent all these years hating her. He has wanted her to be happy even when he has treated her unspeakably cruelly. Perhaps he did not think himself cruel; perhaps he did not do it to hurt her; perhaps he wants her to embrace him as Cat does and say that nothing matters now and that she understands his reasons. But do his reasons truly matter? She cannot think that they do.

This would be the moment to demand answers, to tell him how he has hurt her, but Lysa does not wish to speak of it. She merely jerks her head and turns back to the children’s game, and she is very grateful when Cat, risen from her sleep, comes into the room.


End file.
